Slavery comes to the new world -- American slavery -- Ratifying and interpreting the constitution -- Dred Scott and the Missouri compromise -- The Civil War -- Abraham Lincoln and human freedom -- Reconstruction : military rule in the post-Civil War South -- Jim Crow -- The federal government orchestrates racism -- Black education in the South and the end of Jim Crow after Brown v. Board of Education -- The civil rights legislation of the 1960s and afterward -- How Democrats and Republicans use racial rhetoric to get elected -- Justice and law enforcement -- Baseball.

Today's race relations," law professor Ford demonstrates, "are more complex and contradictory than those of the unambiguously white supremacist past." In this journey through a political minefield, he examines dubious charges of racism and other kinds of bias, while acknowledging that exaggerated claims can piggyback on real examples of victimization. But the author's tenor is often more eye-catching than eye-opening. He revisits Tawana Brawley, Clarence Thomas, O.J. Simpson and Hurricane Katrina, along with Oprah's Hermes problem, Jay-Z's with champagne and Danny Glover's with New York City cabdrivers. Yet at its core, this book raises probing questions about the extent to which "the extraordinary social and legal condemnation of racism and other social prejudices encourages people to recast what are basically run-of-the-mill social conflicts as cases of bigotry." By analogy, he addresses issues concerning animal liberation, gay marriage, "appearance discrimination," "sex harassment law" and multiculturalism. In delineating the differences between formal discrimination, discriminatory intent and discriminatory effects, Ford also reviews thorny legal cases involving, for example, McDonnell Douglas and Price Waterhouse. Readers all along the political spectrum will find much to please, annoy and provoke thought about the thin "line between invidious discrimination and plan old unfairness." (Feb.) Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Author and history professor Roediger (The Wages of Whiteness) takes a provocative look at how white elites in the U.S. have managed race for their own political and economic gain, in the process making it one of the defining features of American life. Only a few decades after Europeans' arrival in America, emerging class tensions were leading indentured servants-white and black-to disaffection and, sometimes, rebellion. By enslaving blacks, and giving poor whites dominating roles as overseers or slave catchers, elite whites quashed the emerging fraternity and gave birth to white supremacy. Since, successive generations-from slave holders to factory managers-have manipulated laborers to keep African Americans at the bottom of the heap, while new waves of immigrants secured the benefits of white privilege by distancing themselves from people of color and assimilating. Taking his history through the Clinton era ("How Race Survived Modern Liberalism"), Roediger includes an afterword on "the Obama Phenomenon," finding yet more questions in the African-American senator's triumphant presidential campaign. This rousing, thought-provoking history illuminates the enveloping 400-year-old history of race in America, and the issues he raises are as relevant as ever. (Nov.) Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information